week 11. the path face plant.

This week has been one consistent with previous weeks to a worse position. I basically tripped pretty hard this week attempting to jog on my path. I tried to balance myself before I face planted pretty hard on the sidewalk. Below are three ways that I was initially thinking about the design of what viewing one memory would be like. I now that the first option is a bit of an eyesore but I was thinking of having a closer representation to film/photo/documentary/memory feel that the website is focused on. Option 2 was pulled back + more focused on the old school TV feel when the screens were squares with rounded corners. Option 3 was back on the idea of memories and thoughts being projected in our mind (and on a projector screen). The quick creation was a rough edit of cutting out the white around the projector screen edges. 

The color scheme is black, white + darker gray with many a hint of color. The main focus will be on the memories and thus where most color will be located as the website is the hub for memories.

I found this software called Reflector. It allows you to record + save your interactions on an iPhone or iPad, which then led me to the thought that I could easily use that to record interactions of a website without need the ability to code a site.

option 01.

option 02.

option 03.

test video of recording navigation on an iPhone via my computer.

name options at this point.

I really like the interaction between the m + f so I may stick with memory framer, unless I find another f word or another letter that creates a similar.

weekend plan.

I am creating, taking + editing the film for the free form expression.

I am designing + setting up the website.

I am attempting to finalize the name and branding.

I need to start figuring my PDF Process book layout.

I should start on my presentation.

week 10. slowed forward movement.

I started to work on the branding and kept running into this issue of what is the best way to describe it? I went back to looking at quotes, phrases, poems, lyrics, anything that dealt with text that I had tweeted and tried to pull inspiration from that. I then went back to my last list of name options and tried to pull different options.

the tweeted information.
Subconscious, mind, memories, ride, circle, cycle, line, pursing you, subjectivity, brain waters, tap in, play off “hooked on phonics,” “dive down deep, past breath + sight, into sense + texture,” stationary scamper, False Awakening, arbitrary, perception, "In memory my thoughts take actions and my mind takes the backseat," re-unitement, hole in plaid, displacement, appears, backhanded, transcendence, thinking, grawlix, dense, “There’s more to see than can ever be seen, more to do than can ever be done. –The Lion King,” lucid interval, human history, “If we put a giant mirror 10 light years away from Earth and looked at it through a telescope, theoretically we'd see 20 years into the past.” “I want to add something to this world. –Remy (Ratatouille),” vivid nightmares, sleep only kills the dream, lack a filter, displacement, rebooted mind, "sometimes you fail + sometimes you don't—but you're always where you need to be," aesthetics, one little conversation can change things forever, “I relived important life moments through a collection of images, dreamt more vividly than I have in a while.”

some of the key words + phrases that I was pulling.
the memory archive
memory framer
pasted interaction/connections/memories
vivid
dreamt
memory
transposition
memory: slam, swap
formulate
rebooted / revived / restart
faltered story
moment
souvenir
expression

most potential names thus far.
pasted memories
memory framer

taglines (only one so far)

post. create. express.

I've been trying to figure what the display/organization of memories would look like rendered online. I can't create what I am seeing in my mind yet, but this is some bad format of it. But the idea of the videos/stories being in this larger circle square shape. I was also trying to think about how memories would transition into one another. Is it a fade out, slow overlap or something else? Do the memories go both to the left and right? Are they stacked up? Are they gridded out? Or? Are the brightest memories in front? Is there order? I need to keep pushing and trying to think how memories would best be displayed.

what is next?I need to name it all this weekend. I really think the the logo will become part of the icons that will be used for the three parts of memory/story creation on the website. I need to put together some more solid visuals of the interface. I should probably be thinking about the main page when logged in. How do those memories look? Whose can you see? Figure out the way that you will be distorting the memories in small but noticeable changes. I should start thinking about the story of the video that will describe this. I need to finish that video clip thing, the free form expression. I need to do a bunch.random thoughts.
I keep thinking of Kingdom Hospital, the TV series and I am not totally sure why.

week 10. imagine it. see it take 01.

you’re walking around in a seeming to be endless space. it’s dark here. there is no set format, doorways appear randomly and sometimes disappear after an instant.

there's just a silent hum and once in a while you hear a few breaths, sometimes a heartbeat. there’s something beautiful in how simple everything is.

it’s pretty dark you realize as you walk further—so dark that you’ve been wondering how you’re moving through this space…do you even know where you’re going? you brush that thought aside and continue to walk freely through the room, but not down the center, you stick to the walls.

you reach a door that’s wide open. you walk in. a dim light bulb hangs down from the ceiling. the walls are black. there's a large projector screen flat against the wall, but nothing is playing. you hear a noise outside of the room and move to investigate.

it looks just the same as before. darkness. you hear the noise again and see a closed door, this one has light coming under the door. you move towards it. then you notice another door. its door is open and a ridiculous amount of florescent lights are on in the room. you walk into the bright room.

you feel like you may become blinded by the amount of light here and hear the sound. you squint your eyes and notice these walls are black and has a projector screen too—a video plays on loop on this one. you hear the sound again. like clockwork, every 10 seconds—but then not so much. it keeps changing.

you look at the screen. sights—sights from a car in black and white. it looks familiar. you move forward. just then you start hearing someone mumbling loudly. you remember where the sights are from and you look back towards the screen. it’s now vividly colored. you involuntarily shake. it reminds you a lot of the day you got into that car wreck, almost the actual day—that was the road you were on, you drive it everyday. those birds weren’t there though and the grass wasn’t super green.

it looks JUST like the day that you got into that accident. the sound goes up on the video. you hear your car tires connecting to the road and your keys hitting the steering wheel. you hear laughter right behind you. you turn around.

these are the first test videos below.

test 01.


test 02.

week 09. hold the phone. found inspiration.

I know this is a bit out of the normal schedule, but I saw this project off Behance + connected right away with it. The video is partially what I have been mentally envisioning for the third main experience of my site, the "free form expression." It has that DIY feel, but also that personal flow to it, as if we, the viewer are peeping in on someones mind. I bet you may be thinking that the sound/voice/music may be creepy or a bit off-settling, BUT that it totally how I see minds/memories/thoughts all working together. It's like that moment in movie where things are unnervingly silent or the movie slows down right before the huge action moment or the unsuspecting victim in a horror film that is about to be attacked; it is the slow creep of a moment where you know it is coming and you are a bit uncomfortable with what is about to happen. I truly think that is how the mind really is, if you could walk around in it.

Can you imagine if we could actually experience that? Imagine walking around your brain and being able to see where and how things connect. There would be big video screens of intense colors, moments of black, as well as your videos of your memories from your view/however your mind is still remembering it. There'd be smoke and distortion all around you. There'd be screaming, shouting, bad singing and crying. There'd be people walking around ignoring you and others following you as you walk around, some quiet, some loud, some shouting/screaming/pleading with you. It would be intense, potentially scarring, but interesting on all fronts.


L'Inquiétude from Diogo Azevedo on Vimeo.

more information about this actual project can be found here. It was a collaborative project by Diogo Azevedo, Beatriz Severes, Joana Coelho + Marta Barros.

week 09. the replay, retake, rebuff.

If you've been playing along, I was in the need to rethink + refocus my project. Although it is a good idea of a site—it was too huge of an idea in the way of creating this multi-faceted system. I was left with the need to find a way to cut down on what I was going to provide to the audience as a general overview of how the website works.

The website focus is three parts:
post a moment.
create a souvenir.
free form expression.

video/visual inspiration.
My initial thoughts for the free form expression/video is that it is a bit like music videos where it follows a narrative and you know what you are following. My second thought is that it is more experimental to the point of a bit eerie and similar to dreams and memories you don't quiet know what you are watching and what any of it means ("see Overlapping Memories"). I think John Legend's "All of Me" is a split between what is happening in his mind/his memories that he is reliving while on the piano and then what is actually happening. And it ends with real footage of his wedding, which really drives home that memory aspect + reality and dreaming meshing in our minds.

"State of Grace" by Talib Kweli ft. Abby Dobson
"Losing Sleep" by John Newman
"Zombie" by the Cranberries
"Iris" by the Goo Goo Dolls
"Porcelain Doll" by Snowbird
"All of Me" by John Legend
"3 Libras" by A Perfect Circle
Overlapping Memories

name options/meanings/words.
the archive
archive eater/gorger
archi-creative
archi-ingenious
archi-innovate / the archi-innovator
the inaugurate creative
the intuitive teller/ intuitive tellers
the voracious storyteller
the starving storyteller
cerebral seducer
cerebral initiator
discourse retrospection
retrospection initiator
memory framer* (tyler says this one is the closest but not there)

the plan.
This weekend's plan is to shoot a video + create a free form expression. Then I will be able to figure out the kind of features that I should have that would creatively limit the user, as to not overwhelm them yet still allow them to make some brilliant videos. I also plan figure out branding this weekend. I have some website names that I've been pushing around and the initial logos from my midterm presentation, even though I know that I had to do a lot of work to it.

I still have some content from John when I had sent him a personal story that I had written and may try to use that in my website. I also need to put together some print materials that someone would want to keep + have printed; a souvenir and worthy information for that printed piece(s) which I am hoping to find in the emails that John has sent me over the past three years. It might be cool to have some kind of printed book depicting the story in printed format too—but would that be difficult to mock up?

think about.
interface could work similar to the way that your memories work. the closest memories are normally the clearest, where as ones further back are less descriptive and not always accessible or simply became distorted. what if it was also navigation through the left + right brain with the idea of logical side + creative side? How will navigation tuck itself away so you can experience the stories + memories without being distracted by content. what if you haven't checked in for a while and so the website is slow moving and not connecting thoughts? or maybe the whole program is black + white or color in the logical side, but on the creative side everything is intensified or bursting with color so bright that the colors glow?

week 08. spring break, my memory.

I took Spring Break to step away from the project + focus on my own creation of memories. I explored Colorado out by myself, often taking to the road, blasting music + driving without a purpose, without knowledge of where I was going—I let go + drove.

I left the MO later than I wanted on Saturday, but drove with the windows down through the eerily flat state of Kansas. It was the first time in my short history of driving that I wanted to stop + questioned if I would make it there.

The second night I was there I checked into my hotel + settled in, hopped into my car and drove as the sun set and I was left with these vividly blue visuals.

After that night, if I went traveling by daylight I saw beautiful mountains and nature.

The last AnnaSights of the trip. The last bits of nature in its raw form and 9+ hours of solo thinking driving.

I thought a lot more about the way that I was sharing my trip experience with different ages and background of people in different formats. 

I was: 

texting my mom every time I stopped to gas up the car or I got hungry.

posting images to Instagram.

sending images via text.

verbally telling my classmates.

digitally writing/sending messages via email or online chat.

snap chatting images or small video clips that would disappear after 24 hrs either to people or to "my story."

tweeting snippets of thoughts or overheard statements.
uploaded an album of images to Facebook.

and of course the whole mental keeping of it all.

And I started to question what the truest way to represent that trip, that memory, that event was. Or did I really want to create something that felt like what I experienced + not focus on the set facts, order of images, videos, etc. What is more important in an event? The specific set up of the day and how it works out? How you felt or what it seemed like, via comparisons? Or both? Or something completely different?

THEN.

I thought what if we could bring in all of that content from other accounts, as well as upload new information. Also, I found this article Your memory is no video camera: It edits the past with present experiences and I further pondered on memory, experience + connection.

making connections.

I apparently never looked at the blog this afternoon, so my apologies for this being late.

Communication as the overall topic is what most schools have as a major; graphic design is a specific way of formatting communication. Visual communication is the method of using art/images/photographs/props/things + typography to express an overall topic, subject, idea + message. And, we actually were in two parts of that class that focused on the way in which we create messages as designers. The main use of graphic design, to appeal, inform or provoke a specific audience to do or think a certain way which is where visual communication comes into play to help us organize and illustrate information into easy to digest pieces of information. Due to the connotations connected to everything from colors to countries to words to hierarchy, designers are given the task of researching a particular audience for their project to understand how the particular audience thinks, interacts and plays.

For my degree project, visual communication is the method in which I will entice people to create + share memories, then turn around and connect with others. This includes website name, phrases + wording, as well as colors, attributes, site navigation, site design and really everything else that is any form of graphic or web design. We create + organize content and provide directions that can be easily understood and followed by a specific audience. Specifically for the sharing of memories I will be creating an easy to navigate website that will allow users to select different layouts to save their memories as well as share with others online. I will be using easy to understand/relate icons to actions that will be expressed on the website. For the potential printed or digital pieces, I will utilize a clear hierarchy that keeps the focus for each of those products where they should be. I will also be looking at how + what users of this website would really want to use it for and how it would be used.